Questions & Answers about Hän on noin kuusikymmentäkaksi vuotta vanha.
The translation says "He is", but how do we know it's a man?
In Finnish, the pronoun hän means both "he" and "she" because the language does not have gendered pronouns. Out of context, this sentence could just as easily mean "She is about sixty-two years old."
Kuusikymmentäkaksi is a huge word! How do I break it down?
In Finnish, compound numbers are written together as one single word. You can read it as kuusi (six) + kymmentä (tens) + kaksi (two). So it literally translates to "six tens two".
Why is the word for year written as vuotta instead of the dictionary form vuosi?
In Finnish, whenever you have a number greater than one, the noun that follows it must take a special form called the partitive case. Because the number here is 62, the basic word vuosi (year) changes to its partitive form, vuotta.
Is the structure for expressing age the exact same in Finnish as it is in English?
Yes! Just like in English, Finnish uses the verb "to be" (olla) to express age, followed by the number, the word for years, and the word for old (vanha). Note that in everyday speech, Finns often drop the word vanha completely and just say Hän on noin kuusikymmentäkaksi vuotta.